SinoSoviet

Sino-Soviet refers to the historical political, economic, and ideological relationship between the People’s Republic of China and the Soviet Union, later the Russian Federation, from the early Cold War era onward. The alliance began with shared revolutionary ideals and was formalized in a series of agreements, including the 1950 Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance, which opened Soviet economic aid, technology transfer, and military support to the PRC. The two countries cooperated on heavy industry, infrastructure projects, and military matters, and Chinese and Soviet leaders sometimes presented a united front in international forums.

Tensions began to mount in the mid-1950s and escalated after the rise of Nikita Khrushchev in the Soviet leadership. Differences over ideology, leadership within the communist world, and approaches to peaceful coexistence widened into a significant split. By the early 1960s, the Soviet Union withdrew many technicians and curtailed aid, and diplomatic ties deteriorated to the point of a formal rupture. The split intensified with border incidents, most notably the clashes along the Ussuri River in 1969, signaling a major shift from alliance to rivalry.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Sino-Soviet relations remained adversarial for the most part, though limited pragmatic engagement continued in areas of mutual interest. With the ascent of Mikhail Gorbachev in the Soviet Union and Deng Xiaoping in China, dialogue gradually resumed, leading to partial normalization in the late 1980s. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the relationship transitioned to the interactions between the PRC and the Russian Federation, marking the end of the original Sino-Soviet conjuncture and the beginning of a new phase in Sino-Russian relations.